The Delhi High Court has held that there would be no justification for denying custody of the children to the father (Appellant) while they were in London from June 28, 2026 to July 05, 2026, and that the Family Court’s restriction confining the Appellant’s access to India alone was unsustainable. The Court further held that the wife’s (Respondent’s) objections founded on expenditure and alleged flight risk did not justify refusal of interim custody, particularly when adequate safeguards could be imposed by retaining the children’s passports with the Respondent and restricting the children’s movement outside London.
The Court therefore concluded that interim custody ought to be granted for the limited London period, subject to the Appellant bearing the cost of the return air tickets purchased by the Respondent for the children’s Delhi-London-Delhi travel. The Court directed that the Appellant shall be entitled to custody of both children in London from June 28, 2026 to July 05, 2026, subject to transferring, on or before June 25, 2026, the entire cost of the return air tickets purchased by the Respondent for the children’s travel from Delhi to London and back into the Respondent’s bank account, failing which he would not be entitled to such custody. The Court further directed that the passports of the children shall remain in the custody of the Respondent and shall not be handed over to the Appellant.
The Division Bench comprising Justice Tejas Karia and Justice Madhu Jain observed that the reasoning adopted by the Family Court, namely that the Appellant may spend time with the children only in India and not in London, was unsupported by any material on record, particularly since the children had resided in London from 2015 to 2019 along with both parties. The Bench further observed that the source from which the Appellant proposed to incur expenditure for the vacation was not a relevant consideration for determining interim custody, and the Respondent’s apprehension that the Appellant may abscond with the children to Mauritius from London was speculative and without merit.
The Bench also noted that such apprehension would equally arise even if the children were with the Appellant in India, and in any event, since the children’s passports remained with the Respondent, it was highly unlikely that the Appellant could procure duplicate passports and remove the children. The Bench additionally found that, once the Respondent had no objection to the Appellant taking custody of the children in India, her contention that he was incapable of taking care of them alone could not be accepted in relation to London.
Briefly, the appeal under Section 19 of the Family Courts Act, 1984 challenged the order passed by the Family Court, whereby the Appellant’s application under Section 26 of the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955 seeking interim custody of the minor children in London from June 28, 2026 to July 05, 2026 was dismissed. The Appellant contended that he had first informed the Respondent on April 14, 2026 of his proposed London trip with the children during summer vacation, had later curtailed his request from 15 days to 7 days to accommodate the Respondent’s plans, and was wrongly denied an opportunity to spend time with the children while they were in London.
The Respondent opposed the request on grounds including maintainability, apprehension that the Appellant may abscond with the children, alleged offshore receipt of funds, lack of maintenance, and the fact that the children’s London travel had been arranged and financed by the Respondent’s parents. The record also showed that both parties and the children were residing in the same house, that the children were to remain in London with the Respondent from June 15, 2026 to July 20, 2026, and that the children’s passports were in the custody of the Respondent.
